


The Horse Fair

by tigriswolf



Series: poetry [76]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Gen, Memories, Painting, Poetry, Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-17
Updated: 2017-06-17
Packaged: 2018-11-15 05:27:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 390
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11224272
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tigriswolf/pseuds/tigriswolf
Summary: Memories of standing before apainting.





	The Horse Fair

**Author's Note:**

> Written June 8, 2017, for the painting analysis lesson in a poetry class.
> 
> I also created an Animoto video to go with this: [The Horse Fair](https://animoto.com/play/5E2Pzd4AY9E43dUbHrBH2A?autostart=1). (Be warned of sound.)

18 years old,  
graduation behind me—  
Mom said to pick a place  
and I chose New York, New York.

Too loud, too bright,  
more than I’d expected.  
(What had I expected?)  
Saw the sights, watched some shows,  
walked around and rode the subway.  
I felt so far from home.

But the art—  
Did it kindle my love or simply exacerbate it?

I can still remember when I saw  
Rosa Bonheur’s ‘The Horse Fair’:  
So massive, so vivid, so precise.  
I could hear the rushing hooves, the wind roaring,  
how the horses would neigh and whinny,  
the crack of the riding crop,  
the men shouting, thinking they had control—  
I’ve ridden horses,  
and I’m not so sure those men were right.

The stench of horse shit and sweat and dirt,  
tossed around by what should be a welcome breeze—  
I stare at this painting,  
the size of a wall,  
and feel the wind move my hair,  
that odor slamming into me.  
It’s one of the things I don’t miss  
from those years with the horses.

I could reach out to touch a horse’s flank—  
The dapple gray, I think,  
because he seems calm and the closest to me.

But my fingers touch only paint.  
They could prance off the wall, surely,  
cavort around me.  
I could tangle my fingers in a mane,  
another and another,  
my hands growing slick with sweat,  
grit in my mouth from the dust stirred up  
by a hundred horses—

But the floor is tile beneath my shoes.  
I can’t leap onto a back and kick the horse into a canter,  
can’t rub his nose or check his hooves for rocks,  
can’t laugh as we race the wind and always lose.

I’m standing in a gallery, sterile, quiet.  
18 years old in New York.  
The horses cannot stamp off the wall,  
out of pigment and into the world.

I close my eyes and I go back to that girl,  
awed, enamored, caught in majesty and never released.  
I close my eyes and I see those horses.  
I stand there and I yearn to go back to the horses,  
to be the girl I was years ago.

I step away from the wall,  
open my eyes, turn to continue on,  
an entire museum to explore—  
But I look back.  
Years and a continent away,  
I’m still looking back.


End file.
